Into The Void

by Ryan Frieda

  Captain Steele grabbed Ruthless' body and pushed his dead corpse in front of him as he pushed Shadow away. The grenade exploded sending an explosion of shrapnel and energy in all directions including towards Captain Steele. The energy and shrapnel hit Ruthless' body tearing it apart knocking Captain Steele backwards. He readjusted his course with the thrusters on the suit.

  Captain Steele looked back and saw that the grenade had hit Ark Angel hard seriously injuring her and saw Shadow happen to avoid most of the blast. Captain Steele looked up and saw Catalyst floating above him with his rifle pointed at him. Captain Steele grabbed his rifle, moved sideways as Catalyst fired barely missing him. Captain Steele fired several rounds as Catalyst moved. Catalyst then threw another grenade and Captain Steele evaded it pushing off the asteroid. Captain Steele fired more rounds while moving. He successfully shot the grenade, knocking it off course and back towards Catalyst. Several of Captain Steele's bullets also hit Catalyst, killing Catalyst. The grenade went off about 10 feet below and to the left of Captain Steele.

  After the explosion Captain Steele looked back and saw that Shadow got a heavy hit from the second grenade killing her. He looked for Ark Angel and saw that she was trying to patch her wounds. He flew in next to her and flew her to the nearest asteroid. She had taken a significant amount of damage. He tried to patch her up as he looked around for Runner. He couldn't find him anywhere. The only two people who were still able to fight well were him and Runner.

  Captain Steele patched up Ark Angel's wounds the best he could but she was going to die.

  “Let me help you find Runner and let kill him Omega,” Ark Angel said.

  “I never wanted to kill my friends,” Captain Steele said.

  “I know. Let's face it,” Ark Angel said looking at her wounds, “You were always better than me. I know with my injuries I'm going to die, so let me help you finish this. Let's go find Runner.”

  Captain Steele and Ark Angel gathered the others items and searched for Runner. Captain Steele looked at everything. Only one minute in and four of the six of the best of the best had been killed. He could barely believe that this was part of the mission. He was surprised that having to kill his own family was necessary.

  Captain Steele and Ark Angel carefully combed the asteroids looking for Runner.

  “He's dead ahead Omega. Let me take the shot. I know you always protect your team and killing them is not your thing.”

  “Let's try to talk to him first.”

  “He's running to later ambush us. You know that, why run only to talk later?”

  Captain Steele sighed. He knew she was right. He reluctantly handed Ark Angel his rifle. She looked down the sights and fired two rounds hitting Runner in the back of the head as he was running away. She then turned the gun on herself.

  “You need the oxygen,” Ark Angel said.

  “We can find a way to survive,” Captain Steele replied.

  “I'm too wounded and I'm going to die anyway. This way it'll be fast.”

  “We can make a makeshift hole in an asteroid with the remaining grenades. I just need to check the others equipment.”

  “To much oxygen has been lost already. Splitting it between people would just lead to both our deaths.”

  Captain Steele knew she was right.

  “It's been an honor training with the great Omega,” Ark Angel said.

  “The honor's been all mine... Ark Angel,” Captain Steele replied.

  “Thanks for everything Omega,” Ark Angel said with a tear running down her cheek as she pulled the trigger.

  Captain Steele paused for a minute to remember his family then set up for when the ship would come through. He had had enough of this training. When that ship guilty of killing innocent people came by, they were going to suffer. They were going to die for what they did and after what he just went through they were going to experience what the deepest pit of hell was like while they were still alive.

  “How are you feeling John?” Jamie asked him.

  “I feel terrible. What happened?”

  “It seems that the planet's atmosphere contained a pathogen that gave you hallucinations. The pain you felt was caused by the pathogen when you resisted it or it's hallucinations. You must have breathed it in when you removed your helmet. You have been out of it for three days.”

  “How much of it was real?”

  “From what you were saying, none of it. The island started to fall apart at some point. It had taken extreme damage from all the wind over the years and we were just on it at the wrong time. The ship sustained some damage trying to pick you up,” Jamie said.

  “Can't I leave you to fly my ship without breaking it?” Captain Steele asked.

  “I felt the maneuvers preformed were necessary to pick you up,” Jamie said.

  “Yeah. I do appreciate you coming back for me again.”

  “I am glad you are back on board,” Jamie said, “I have another anomaly to show you.”

  “Let's get moving ahead. We are years behind schedule. I don't really feel like any more anomalies at the moment.”

  “I understand John, however your mission is to check them out,”

  “Yeah, I know. It's just the with the broken bones, the coma's, the lost limbs, the extensive damage to my ship and the me being the galaxy's last hope-”

  “Yes John, I understand. Just don't forget the hallucinations, the loss of the science lab-”

  “Hey! The science lab was your flying, not mine. That one falls on you.”

  “Okay. What about all the stupid things you've done?” Jamie said.

  “Like what?” Captain Steele asked.

  “Well, for starters in the year 4005-”

  “Okay, wow, that was like decades ago.”

  “Exactly,” Jamie smugly replied.

  “Alright alright! So I may have made a bad decision every-” Captain Steele started to say.

  “-Time you leave the darn ship?” Jamie interrupted him.

  “Okay, okay! Calm down. Cool your ti-”

  “I am an Artificial Intelligence. I do not have them and they can not be cooled off.”

  “Okay. Calm down, take it down a notch. Everything's going to be okay,” Captain Steele said.

  Captain Steele got up and walked around the ship to check on the damage. He came across the cargo hold and saw it was sealed off.

  “How bad is it in there?”

  “It's bad. Life support, gravity, and electrical systems are all down,” Jamie said.

  “Let's get to work then. I'll go suit up then see what I can do.”

  Captain Steele put on his DSSM suit and walked in. He noticed pieces of debris and cargo floating everywhere. With the lights off it was hard to tell what was cargo and what was debris. He used his flashlight to find the hole in the hull. After finding it he went to work on patching it. After that he went to work on fixing the electrical systems, life support, and gravity. After it was all taken care of he took inventory of everything and saw that they were low on spare parts.

  “Jamie, were low on spare parts. I think we better take it easy from now on,” Captain Steele said.

  “Noted.”

  After putting everything back in its place and moving on Captain Steele took his suit off and sat down for some lunch. As he was fidgeting through the supplies he noticed the “low supply” light was on.

  “Were low on food too? How? I'm the only one that eats on this ship.”

  “We lost some on our race back to you after you died on that planet. We lost a lot,” Jamie said.

  “Low water, food, oxygen, supplies. At this rate it's looking pretty grim. We are over two decades behind schedule, just about half way through the mission, and I'm getting older by the day,” Captain Steele said.

  “But you still look young John,” Jamie said.

  “Yeah. Not that bad for what we've been through. Thank you for reminding me of that.”

  “Anytime John. Besides the 'low supply' is proportional to where we are
on our journey. It's says its low now but if we start to make up time it won't be. Besides, we are growing food in the food storage area so you won't have to worry to much. Anyway, shall we move forward?”

  “You calling me fat?” Captain Steele asked.

  “No, I am, however, saying you do eat your fair share of food.”

  “I'm the only one who eats so yeah, I'll just keep eating my fair share.”

  “Which is 100%,” Jamie replied.

  “And to be honest, you did lose lots on the way back to save me. So technically that bit's on you.”

  “But I did save your life.”

  “Your never going to let me forget will you?”

  “Nope,” Jamie said laughing.

  “Alright then, let's go.”

  Chapter 16

  Possible Impossibility

  Captain Steele woke from his sleep and made his way out of bed, his body feeling stiff. He slowly stretched then walked to the kitchen to make him something to eat. After he made himself something to eat he then walked to the rec room to watch something funny. After about 30 minutes into the show he realized that Jamie hadn't greeted him yet. He walked to the bridge hoping to find her holographic image floating somewhere. He looked around and failed to find her. He then checked the lab, cargo bay, med bay, and then went to the engine room where he saw Jamie.

  “Jamie? You alright?” He asked.

  “Yes. I was just admiring the engines.”

  “That's an odd thing to admire after all these years.”

  “I know.”

  “It's only been close to 100 years since we left,” Captain Steele said.

  “Yes. Still I've never taken the time to just slow down and appreciate things. These engines are really impressive.”

  “Well, yeah. There are top of the line. Designed 100 years ahead of their time.”

  “I never understood how you could just lounge around on this ship when your not maintaining it or exploring an anomaly until now,” Jamie said.

  “Your the most advanced artificial intelligence to ever be created and it took you 100 years to learn to relax?”

  “I know how to relax, but to truly appreciate something for what it is, good or bad, is something so simple that I overlooked it,” Jamie said.

  “Yeah, well, stop it. Your kinda creeping me out,” Captain Steele said as he turned to leave the engine room.

  “I am sorry John. It's just that these engines are really really complex.”

  “Yeah...” Captain Steele said, “It's okay. I just think it's kinda weird that an AI is suddenly admiring an engine after being in a small area with said engine for close to 100 years.”

  Captain Steele went back to the rec room to enjoying watching the comedy show that was on the holoscreen. He sat down to watch it where he left off. When it ended he got up and decided to work out. 45 minutes later he was interrupted by Jamie.

  “Anomaly John.”

  “Another? I didn't think there would be so many out here in the void between galaxies.”

  “No one would have predicted it.”

  “Whatcha got for me Jamie?” Captain Steele said as he threw a towel soaked full of sweat into the corner.

  “Why do you have to do that?” Jamie asked.

  “I'll pick it up later.”

  “What if it grows mold?”

  “Then we can study it together to see how mold grows in intergalactic space.”

  Jamie sighed.

  “Seriously, work needs to be done, and it's not going to go anywhere so I can pick it up later. Priorities Jamie, priorities,” Captain Steele said.

  “Your so similar to the man I met all those years ago, but yet you've changed so much.”

  “That's a good thing right?”

  “I think it's a great thing.”

  “I'm glad were in agreement on that. So, back to business, what's the anomaly?” Captain Steele asked.

  “It appears we have a black dwarf ahead of us.”

  “A star that was run out of heat and energy and has died?” Captain Steele asked.

  “Exactly. Black dwarfs shouldn't exist yet. We may have found the first black dwarf ever. No star in the universe has cooled enough to become a black dwarf. It takes billions upon billions of years. The soonest a star could have run out of energy and have completely cooled off so that its no longer emitting heat or radiation would take well over 14 billion years. In fact, current theory says it would take one septentrigintillion years. That's 1 with 114 zeros attached to it. This means there is no way a star could have completely cooled to be a black dwarf.”

  “Refresh my memory. How exactly does black dwarf form?” Captain Steele asked.

  “Well, a black dwarf comes from the medium sized star. A medium sized star has lots of hydrogen stored up inside the core of the star that it burns through a nuclear reaction like process. The star slowly burns the hydrogen. As it does so it fuses the atoms together into helium. All stars also have enough mass to have gravity. When a star is born it has gravity pulling itself into itself but the nuclear fusion process the star uses keeps the star from falling into itself by pushing out energy. It's a really delicate balance,” Jamie explained.

  “Okay I got it, please go on Jamie,” Captain Steele said.

  “Once the hydrogen runs out the core of the star will collapse under its own weight because of the gravity it has pulling it in. The star then gets denser and hotter until it uses the helium atoms as fuel. After some time it then fuses the helium atoms together to make carbon and oxygen, which are the next heavier elements it could create. As it does this it creates more energy causing the outer layers of the star to grow. As it grows it becomes a red giant. As the red giant gets bigger and bigger the outer layers of the star get so far from its gravity well that it drifts off into space and becomes a nebula, creating beautiful, colorful clouds. This colorful cloud is the outer layers of the star.

  “Once all the outer layers drift away all that remains is the core of the star. This is when it becomes a white dwarf. The core has used up all the energy it can and is dead. It still emits heat, light, and radiation because the core is still warm. It's a lot like when the stove remains warm after you turn it off. After all the heat wears off, the core becomes completely cool then it is becomes a black dwarf. This is the most basic explanation of a black dwarf,” Jamie explained.

  “Thanks for the refresher,” Captain Steele said, “So what exactly is the black dwarf made of?”

  “Unknown. As the white dwarf cools it stops fusing new elements. Currently theory says its just a bunch of electron-degenerate matter. A simple answer of what this is is a low energy distribution, super dense, super compressed form of the materials that were formed by the star during its lifetime. There is a strong probability of some form of oxygen and carbon, which are the basic elements in any white dwarf.”

  “What state of matter? Solid? Plasma?” Captain Steele asked.

  “Degenerate matter.”

  “Okay, but is it solid or is it more of a gas? Every state of matter has some kind of simple explanation. What is this one?”

  “A low energy distribution of super dense, super compressed form of matter,” Jamie explained, “It is unknown if it presents itself in more of a solid, liquid, gas, plasma, or any other state of matter. Until just now, it was simply a hypothesis saying it exists and the state of matter it would be in is purely hypothetical. It is probable that after it has cooled it would be more of a solid but it is currently unknown.”

  “Did you scan out to see what materials are in the star?” Captain Steele asked.

  “Yes I did, and I have received a 85% confirmation reading on oxygen and carbon, a 65% confirmation reading on nitrogen, and a 35% conformation reading on zinc.”

  “No 100% confirmations? Is the scanner broke?”

  “No. It is having a hard time reading the elements. It might be because the elements are super condensed and therefore having a hard time breaking through the material and reading it.
I am unable to tell if the elements are more solid or not. This means I may be wrong on why we are not getting a good scan. I have tried multiple times with the exact same results.”

  “Time to suit up and head down there,” Captain Steele said.

  “I do recommend extreme caution John. As excited as I am to examine this there are several major problems. One of them being that if the scanner is correct in the elements that are down there, and our current theory of black dwarfs are true, that star should not have any zinc on it. Zinc is fused in large stars, not medium to small stars. This means that it should have gone nova and exploded instead. Also, without knowing exactly what degenerate matter really is, or any of the properties of it, or what exactly a black dwarf is, or how it's formed, or anything to that extent, touching it or even coming into close proximity with it could kill you.”

  “Noted. Also, what's that about it being large size star?”

  “It just means we could be wrong about the entire theory about black dwarfs and that there could be much more than meets the eye.”

  “I'll be careful.”

  “Remember, that material is so dense that a roughly a full teaspoon, or about 1/8th a fluid once, worth of the material would have weight equal of a fully grown elephant on Earth. Your DSSM will be taking a heavy blow the closer you get. Please be careful. I can't make any promises that I can save you this time.”

  “I'll be alright,” Captain Steele said.

  Captain Steele put on the DSSM suit, grabbed as many sample containers as he could, and headed back towards the portside airlock. He opened the door and climbed to the outside of the ship. He looked off into the distance where the ships lights where shining and failed to see the object. He used his DSSM's visor to magnify his eyesight onto the object. There it was, as black as the night sky. It was so dark he was having a hard time determining the surface of it, where the surface began and where it ended. It should be about the about 1.50 times the size of Earth but yet it was almost impossible to see.

  Captain Steele climbed to the front of the ship, leaned in the direction the ships lights were facing and pushed off with his legs towards the black dwarf and floated toward it waiting for its gravity to grab hold and pull him in.